Syria chases deal as Hariri verdict looms

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Syria is trying to negotiate a deal to prevent punitive action by the United Nations if, as is widely expected, Damascus is linked to the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri.

US and European officials said representatives of the Syrian President, Bashar al-Assad, had been inquiring about the potential for a deal, roughly equivalent to what the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, did to end tough international sanctions imposed for his country's role in the 1988 midair bombing of Pan Am flight 103, the officials said.

But officials from the United States, France and the UN said they had all signalled to Syria they would not compromise on the completion of a full investigation into the killing of Mr Hariri, or subsequent legal steps.

This week the UN investigation moved to Syria, where Detlev Mehlis, the chief investigator, interviewed the two most recent Syrian intelligence chiefs in Lebanon and their aides. The bombing killed Mr Hariri and 19 others in Beirut in February.

Much rests now on how high up the Syrian regime the investigation reaches. A source close to the investigation said he did not know if there was any evidence to suggest Mr Assad knew of the assassination plot. Since the arrest last month of four Lebanese security officials with close ties to Damascus, Syria had been "running scared", said a US official familiar with the overtures.

Mr Mehlis, who has taken the inquiry far deeper, far faster than at first expected, "is coming up with stuff that is making people in Damascus nervous", the US official said.

Overtures from Damascus have included vague suggestions of a willingness to hand over certain unnamed security individuals in exchange for guarantees that any subsequent trial would not try to point fingers any higher in Syria, several Western officials familiar with Syria's moves said.

On Monday, a US State Department official said there was "universal support" for a fully independent investigation "unfettered by any attempt to influence the result. The outcome must follow the facts where they lead."

He spoke after the first meeting at the UN of a core group of nations working to help Lebanon end years of political domination by Syria, including 29 years of occupation.

The investigation has been aided by an unexpected flow of information from Lebanese security sources as well as at least two well-placed Syrian officials, Western sources said. Some have been moved to Europe, the sources said.

For Mr Assad, a former ophthalmologist who inherited power after the death of his father in 2000, the stakes of the UN investigation are high.

"The Mehlis report is due on October 25, and if he reports that this goes all the way to the top of Damascus, there will be a political earthquake," a European diplomat said.

If the investigation does name Syrian officials, Mr Assad will be under pressure to arrest and try the alleged perpetrators, or face international condemnation and punitive actions, such as economic or diplomatic sanctions.

But turning over some of his own officials could also jeopardise Mr Assad's tenuous hold on power and risk his security staff taking action against him.